The Tales of Minz series is narrated and edited by fictional characters. This short story is set in their whimsical world. Learn more about the series here.
There are major moments in history that need to be recorded and written down for the coming Ages. After all, if we do not learn from the mistakes of the past, we are fated to repeat them in some variation or other. Historians such as myself take great care to preserve such moments and stress their importance to society.
However, those major moments that get recorded and written down are often preserved from a bird’s-eye viewpoint. The “minor” moments get lost and are forgotten. As with all of Vern’s stories, this tale takes a look at one of those “minor” moments… which may or may not turn out not to be as “minor” as it first appears.
—Barnabas E. Wooldridge
Editor in Chief of the Tales of Minz
What are you supposed to do when your whole world is crumbling all around you? How are you supposed to react to chaos and calamity? With horror and dismay… or with grim determination to stand—despite the truly awful hand you’ve been dealt?
This is a story of one young woman’s perseverance and courage to stand against the chaos and calamity of the twelfth day in the month of Delin, 1529 of the Third Age.
Do you recognize that fateful date? If not, allow me to shed some light on that dark moment in Minz’s history. That was the day that the Council of Oligarchs—the forty-seven leaders of Minz, duly appointed by popular vote—fell to infighting and insurrection. That was the day the government fell to pieces in Marglegruff, and what became known as the Warlord Era began.
I myself have never seen a nation crumble and fall. I have never seen a city set ablaze while looters, pillagers, and raiders run rampant through the cobblestone streets. I have never witnessed an entire populace hide away in their homes in fear for their lives while the whole world burned and turned to anarchy and chaos.
Reading the firsthand accounts were enough for me as a storyteller, and I hope I never have to experience such things for myself.
It should be noted that not everyone hid away on that awful day. Marglegruff’s City Watch did their best to keep the peace, but they frankly had their hands full helping the volunteer Fire Brigade keep the city from burning to the ground. Besides, the City Watch were not soldiers. They walked a beat, broke up tavern fights, and handed out carriage parking tickets, but hand-to-hand combat? No, they were ill equipped for such things. They were not like the elite members of the Council Guards—warriors who once stood for honor and virtue and now abandoned their oaths and stood for greed and gain, deciding to sell their swords to the highest bidder.
It was chaos and pandemonium in the streets, pure and simple, on that dark, Delin day. And there, amidst the chaos—our protagonist: Lena.
Observe her for a moment, Dear Reader. Her dark hair was singed and darkened with soot. Her eyes were red from crying and the sting of smoke. Her dress was covered in ash, and wet with blood from a nasty cut on Lena’s upper arm. And yet, she stood—her feet firmly planted on the cobblestone street, shoulder width apart. She looked rooted in place, like she could not move. No. Like she could not be moved. Not by anyone or anything. It wasn’t fear that kept her rooted in place. It was something else. Something more powerful than fear. Something that stared fear in the face and grinned in defiance. Determination. She lifted her hands and cupped them to her mouth—
“People of Marglegruff: the Council of Oligarchs has fallen, but we still stand! We are still here—do not give in and do not give up!”
Lena’s voice was loud and carrying. It cut through the cacophony of noise all around her, and could be heard far and wide throughout the city, despite the din of battle and destruction, shouts, and screams. Her voice had to carry—Lena was one of Marglegruff’s Criers, hired to walk throughout the city and inform the citizens of the news it would behoove them to know.
Shouting the news of the day tended to be something that many people tuned out and ignored. It took a dedicated crier to get them to listen on a normal day. Imagine the skill required to get people to pay attention to your words in the midst of chaos and destruction.
And of course, let’s not forget that because the Council of Oligarchs had just fallen (within the last few hours), no one was going to pay Lena to keep going throughout the city, risking her life for a message or two. That being said, she didn’t quite know what she would do next. No one did. Their world was on fire.
But Lena knew what she would do right then and there. Because she was one of the City Criers of Marglegruff. Her job was to inform citizens of the news they needed to know. In her opinion, this was pretty important information, even if no one was paying her to say it.
“People of Marglegruff: the Council of Oligarchs has fallen, but we still stand! We are still here—do not give in and do not give up!”
Lena shouted those words over and over again until her voice was hoarse, and her throat burned. Hours passed, and still, Lena shouted her message. She moved throughout the city, making sure that it was heard far and wide.
What did she hope to accomplish? Lena didn’t rightly know. She just knew she had to do something. Even if only a handful of people stopped for a moment and listened—even if only one person listened—that would be enough.
The sun sank below the western horizon, yet the city was awash with flickering light from the fires that still burned. And Lena still stood, shouting her message whilst walking through the city of Marglegruff. Until—
“I’ve just about had enough of your drivel.”
The words were spoken in a raspy, sneering tone. Lena looked to her left. There in the alleyway stood the speaker. His greasy hair nearly covered a dark eyepatch, and his one, good eye burned with a malevolent light. His feral grin revealed cracked, yellowed teeth. The brigand hefted a rusty blade, pointing it at Lena as he spoke again.
“The Council of Oligarchs has fallen, but we still stand? What a load of hogwash. Look around you, woman. Your precious city burns, people are running around in a panic, looting and joining the mayhem. Everyone else has given up. Everyone else has fallen—except you. But we can change that.”
The brigand gestured, and two more disheveled, unkempt wretches stepped out of the alleyway shadows, drawing their blades. They looked like they took their fashion and hygiene advice from the first brigand, who looked like he took it from a moldy banana peel in the gutter.
Lena wanted to take a step back. She had no weapon, no means of defending herself. She was a City Crier—not a warrior. She wanted to run. Every instinct of self-preservation screamed at her to do so. But fear struck like lightning and held her fast. She couldn’t move. There was no one else in sight. No members of the City Watch; no knights in shining armor come to rescue her.
And then, as the brigands swaggered forward, Lena felt a burst of defiant anger. If Lena wanted to get out of this, she would have to do it herself. No City Watch, no knights—just Lena. She lifted her chin and glared. She believed in her message. She risked her life to share it far and wide on that awful day. How was this any different? And besides—she had been shouting in the streets for hours now. She hadn’t managed to get anyone to listen to her. Until now. True, the brigand and his fellow wretched were threatening her, but they had listened, hadn’t they?
Listening was the first step. Next came comprehension. Because anyone could listen to what other people had to say. The words could go in one ear and out the other without ever being slowed by anything in between. Lena saw evidence of that all the time. People ignored her, tuned her out, filtered out the messages of the City Criers along with the other sounds of the City. Lena just had to get these brigands to comprehend what she was saying, and then take action. (Preferably one that didn’t end with her dying on the cobblestone street.)
“Are you from Marglegruff?” Lena asked desperately.
The lead brigand paused, and the other two wretches halted beside him. “Born and raised,” The man grunted. “Owned a brewery before Prohibition forced me to close my doors. Lost the brewery, lost the house—I lost everything. Been scraping by ever since.”
“I can see why you’re not too broken up about the Council of Oligarchs falling, then,” Lena said. And she could. Lena had friends and family who wouldn’t shed a tear for the brutal downfall of the previous system of government.
“Course I’m not.” The brigand turned and spat on the ground. “Better off without them, I say.”
“That might be true,” Lena agreed, trying to find common ground with the man. “How do you think I feel? I’m out of a job—no income, no pension, no retirement fund—nothing. And all because… what? The Council of Oligarchs made a bunch of bad decisions that led to them getting overthrown by a bunch of warlords? How is that fair?”
“The rule of the few is just a thinly veiled way for the rich and powerful to make common folk like us feel like we have a voice in the system, even if we really don’t. Problem is, we’ve been living with it for so long, nobody questions it.” The disheveled bandit to the left of the main brigand spoke up with a slightly slurred tone.
They all just stared at him. His comrades looked shocked, as if they hadn’t realized he had the intellect to form sentence endings much less philosophical lines of thought. Finally, the man blinked and shrugged.
“What? I went to the University of Marglegruff for pre-law. Dropped out because I got in deep with a loan shark for betting on the races and tournaments, but I still remember some of what I learned about systems of governance.” The brigand then belched, lessening the wisdom of his words in their eyes ever so slightly.
“And what about you?” Lena turned to the third bandit, who sported a nasty scar from the top of her temple to the left side of her chin, effectively blinding her in one eye. “What’s your story?”
“I started robbing people when I was five,” The woman grunted. “Me ma and pa passed away and I got kicked out of the orphanage for being a bad influence on the other kids. Been living on the streets ever since.” She turned and spat on the cobblestones. “Serves those high and mighty Oligarchs right for ignoring the problems right under their noses, eh?”
“Don’t you see?” Lena asked the three brigands. “That’s exactly what I’ve been saying this whole time!”
The first brigand frowned. “You’ve been saying the Council of Oligarchs got what they deserved? I don’t remember that part.”
“Well, no, not in so many words,” Lena agreed. “But I have been telling people that they don’t need the Council of Oligarchs to tell them what’s right and what’s wrong. They don’t need to turn to chaos and destruction just because the rulers of our society are gone—they can rise above. They can stand. You and I—we can stand. We can be better than the broken systems that came before us.”
The more Lena spoke, the more courageous she became. She was filled with a purpose that felt right, that felt like exactly what she was supposed to be doing. This. This was the message she wanted to spread. This was the message she wanted people to hear. She never imagined in her wildest dreams that the only people who would listen were three brigands of extremely suspect moral fiber, but she also hadn’t imagined that the Oligarchy would fall that morning, so…
Lena pointed at the third brigand. “The orphanages run by the Oligarchy let you down? No one is in charge of them now. You can help build them better so that no kids go through what you experienced.” She turned to the second. “And you—we need people who know broken systems of governance if we’re going to survive this chaotic, anarchical period. We need people who know how to keep the passengers safe even if the boat is sinking. We need leaders, and I think you’re one of them.”
“And what about me?” sneered the first brigand. “Going to tell me that I have an important role to play too?”
Lena frowned at him. “Well, yes, I thought that would have been obvious. You’re a brewer, aren’t you? Prohibition is over. It’s time to go back to work again, my friend.”
The three brigands stood silent for a long moment. Contemplative. Unmoving. A bead of sweat trickled down the side of Lena’s face. She felt a sense of accomplishment, but wasn’t sure if her words had reached their hearts. They still looked unsure.
“Me? Running a whole system of orphanages in Marglegruff?” The third brigand sounded skeptical. “Sounds impossible.”
“Same here,” burped the second brigand. “I haven’t studied law in close to twelve years. What do I know? Why should people listen to me?”
“And I’ve been out of the brewing game for a long while now. It’s not like tying your shoes, you know. I’d have to start from square one with everything.” The first brigand shook his head. “Seems like a whole heap of trouble.”
“But don’t you see?” Lena took a small step forward, closer to the three brigands. “That’s why you have me. That’s why we all have each other. We help each other and get through this together. People of Marglegruff: the Council of Oligarchs has fallen, but we still stand. We are still here—do not give in and do not give up.”
Again, the brigands stood there in that smoke-filled street across from Lena. The warm glow of the burning city behind them painted the western sky orange, even though the sun had already set. Then, slowly, one by one, the brigands began to nod. The first even smiled faintly.
People of Marglegruff: the Council of Oligarchs has fallen, but we still stand! We are still here—do not give in and do not give up.
They were the same words Lena had spoken all day long. They were the same words that had previously caused the first brigand to want to silence Lena for good. But as Lena said those words now, something changed. Something changed in the way she said them, or perhaps, something changed in the hearts of those who heard the words, as they finally, truly listened.
There, on that awful Delin day, amidst all the chaos and calamity, a sense of purpose and camaraderie was awakened in the hearts of several of Marglegruff’s citizens. That sense of community would grow and swell. More and more would add to their numbers day by day throughout the coming weeks and months ahead.
Yes, the world would be living in the Warlord Era for a long time. Anarchy would reign throughout the world… but not in Marglegruff. Not in the streets that once burned. No, in those streets, the people of Marglegruff, that proud city, stood together. They did not give in.
And they did not give up.
